Boston Expressionism. Boston Expressionism emerged in the 1930s as a regional art movement centered in Boston, Massachusetts.
Influenced by German Expressionism and the immigrant experience, this movement was characterized by emotional intensity, social and spiritual themes, and a strong focus on figuration. Key figures like Hyman Bloom, Jack Levine, and Karl Zerbe played pivotal roles in shaping the movement's identity.
Boston Expressionism is an arts movement marked by emotional directness, dark humor, social and spiritual themes, and a tendency toward figuration strong enough that Boston Figurative Expressionism is sometimes used as an alternate term to distinguish it from abstract expressionism, with which it overlapped. Strongly influenced by German Expressionism and by the immigrant, and often Jewish, experience, the movement originated in Boston, Massachusetts, in the 1930s, continues in a third-wave form today, and flourished most markedly in the 1950s-70s.
Most commonly associated with emotionality, and the bold color choices and expressive brushwork of painters central to the movement like Hyman Bloom, Jack Levine and Karl Zerbe, Boston Expressionism is also heavily associated with virtuoso technical skills and the revival of old master technique. The work of sculptor Harold Tovish, which spanned bronze, wood and synthetics is one example of the former, while the gold-and silverpoint found